Perfectly clear skin now! Haven't had skin this good since I was a child! It doesn't work overnight, it really kicked in at about the 2-3 month mark, but absolutely it worked for my constant hormonal cystic acne which I've had for years!

Background - I have PCOS, which is now under control thanks to diet and exercise (meaning, my testosterone which was in the high range years ago, is now in the normal range on all blood work, my TOM is regular and I ovulate every month). Still, some of the effects of PCOS, such as facial hair growth and cystic acne, had remained. The acne has gotten much much better, but would still pop up every now and then. I also have very oily skin. My dermo recommended spiro every time I saw him, and said there were basically no side effects. Even though my skin was decent, compared to how it used to be, I read the reviews and thought, why not try it and have absolutely perfect skin for the first time in my life? He put me on 50 mg for the first 2 weeks, then upped it to 100 mg after that. For the first two weeks I broke out a little, tiny little whitehead type bumps, but nothing major. As soon as I upped it to 100 mg I suddenly had giant cystic eruptions everywhere on my face - my chin was the worst, it genuinely changed the shape of my face because the bumps were so large. I felt like Cyclops. I also broke out on my cheeks, where I had never broken out before in my life. And none of these pimples ever came to a head, so just giant painful bumps which took many weeks to go away. I went back down to 50 mg, which didn't help, so I went down to 25 mg and the giant pimples stopped forming immediately (still took a while for the ones I already had to disappear). I read all the reviews about how you have to give it time and it gets worse before it gets better and I decided to try again, this time only going back up to 50 mg. Immediately I broke out in tiny little white bumps all along my temple into my cheeks. It almost looked like an allergic reaction, it was so so bad. Makeup did nothing to hide it either. I stopped spiro altogether, and it went away almost immediately. It has now been 3 weeks since I've taken spiro and I haven't had a breakout since. I have some scarring which I'm working on, but for me, this drug was the opposite of a wonder drug. It may be that if I had kept taking it, I would have eventually had the clear, soft skin of a newborn, but it wasn't worth going through months looking like Cyclops to get there. The only positive I can say about this drug is that my skin was not oily when I was on it. It didn't get super dry, just stopped it from being oily, and the pores on my nose did look smaller. But for me, it wasn't worth it. My hormones are not out of balance, based on my last few blood tests, so maybe this works better if you're in a stage where your hormones are out of wack? One final note - when I went off spiro, I immediately started spotting. So it can mess with your cycle a bit.

I started on Spiro at 50 mg a day 3 months ago. After 2 months we upped the dose to 100mg/day and added Yaz. After 6 years of relentless, scarring, hideous, cystic acne I have been totally cyst free for nearly 3 weeks. The increase in dose and addition of Yaz was the breakthrough I needed to finally cure my acne! I have had a total of 3 tiny pimples, gone in under 48 hours since upping the dose and I cannot be happier!

Background: I had struggled with mild acne throughout my teen years. However, when I turned 18, my acne became severely cystic. It was getting to the point where I was getting pitted scarring. I was also struggling immensely with my self-esteem. I was terrified of going outside, meeting people, working with others and so forth. I was depressed and had a negative outlook on my future. Anybody who believes your feelings are in vain have no idea what struggling with severe acne is like. Treatment: I, like many with acne, became consumed by looking for a cure (diets, ointments, peroxides etc.). Hoping to stumble upon something that would give me some glimmer of hope. I was too scared to take Accutane, but also fed up with having acne. After struggling for so long and silently, I decided enough was enough. I came across these great reviews and thought what the heck! Currently: I started on 50 mg of sprio and noticed improvement within a few weeks. After 6-months though, I can say my skin has healed so much. I could cry. I still do get SMALL red blemishes every now and then, but it's heaven compared to what I had before. I notice on 75 mg my skin gets clearer (but I've had some side effects on 75 mg like getting my period every 2 weeks, peeing like crazy which is why I stuck to 50 mg). I wasn't expecting perfection, just improvement and I'm much happier now.

I love spiro. I have had moderate hormonal acne since middle school. I took spiro for about 2 years, stopped for a year and just recently started taking it again. I take 100 mgs a day. I think it's great for helping cystic hormonal acne. And when I do get them every once in a blue moon they go away much faster than usual. The only side effect I got from spiro were head aches at the beginning, but those went away after a few weeks. It also helped so much with oiliness which is a life saver. I would recommend spiro to anyone suffering from hormonal acne.

Has cleared up all of my acne and I'm only on 50 milligrams. my scars are starting to fade too!! so happy with the results

I started getting cystic acne when I was about 15 and it all went downhill from there. Treatment after treatment antibiotics and so forth. I'm sure most of rwading this know the struggle. I finally got referred to a competent Dermatologist in June of 2015 when I started taking Spiro along with a RetinA topical cream. It is now January 2016. My face used to be destroyed and covered in breakouts and cysts. I was so depressed most of the time that I'd be willing to go to far lengths just to not have this plague of a horrible disorder of the skin. It took time and patience, but now people don't even belive me when I say I had horrible acne. Just some light scaring and mild breakouts of a pimple or two around my cycle. On that note, I did experience lots of side effects. Some people don't think it's worth it and it depends on the person but I was at my wits end. Some side effects I experienced were: Dizziness, bizarre dreams (especially when starting and lowering or higher ingredients doses), frequent urination, getting dehydrated easily, dry itchy scalp, dry itchy ears on inside, terrible fatigue, and now I've developed dermatitis on my elbows and hands. I am currently weaning of my 25mg twice a day original prescription to just take 25mg once until I stop taking all together. I am hoping this will help the dermatitis go away. My Dermatologist says the dry skin and dermatitis is unrelated but this started happening when I started the medicine so I don't see what else it could have been. Regardless, I was so tired of having red painful dots that screamed "look at my weird face" all the time that I would happily trade it in for the side effects especially if they leave once I stop taking this medicine all together. I'm curious if anyone else had these kind of side effects with dry skin? Good luck.

Little background: It was the end of my Junior year in high school and I got extremely extremely bad acne. It covered my ENTIRE face. I couldn't run my hands over my skin or even wash it without wincing in pain. I became deeply depressed over the summer and barely left my room. I knew I needed help and my mom took me to the doctors. They said I had severe acne and needed medication to help clear it. The first medication I had been on was doxycycline. I was on that for about 4 months and things got clear, not completely but enough. I decided to get off but of course, the acne came back. So I revisited my doctor and got prescribed minocyline and a birth control. I liked mino much better than doxy, one less pill and easier on the stomach. Finally I went to the doctors again for a check up and they decided to check my blood. I have irregular hormone levels, which was causing the acne. In order to correct the levels I needed a medication of course. So I was prescribed spironolactone! I have been on this for about 4 months and absolutely love it. It is 100 times better than any other medication I have tried. It took awhile to get started, maybe 3 months. But my skin was clear, no bumps, no cysts. One thing I would recommend is not waiting to refill.. The past week I forgot and haven't taken the pill in 5 days, and I now have multiple breakouts and cysts around my chin.. Of course I am discouraged but have faith that the pill will fix it all up quickly :)

Spiro literally dried my whole body out! Sure it helps the cystic acne, but at what cost? In 4 months, I gained wrinkles, weight, cellulite, dry eyes, acid reflux and my stomach is constantly bloated. I play soccer constantly and was starting to feel weak....BAM ....muscle loss. I was randomly sweating, I was literally red all the time. I already had sufficient breasts, now they are huge, painful, and annoying! I have been off of this evil drug for 2 weeks and feel a ton better, but still have the bloating, cellulite, and dry eyes. Also, I have issues with anxiety, and this stuff made it WORSE!!!! My skin has NOT gotten worse since I stopped taking it, it has gotten BETTER. How long until all the side effects go away!!?!?!?!?! Anyone else hate their Dr for putting them on this????? I only gave this 1 star because it made me. Should have negative stars!!!!

My skin became so much worse after taking 100mg a day of this medicine. I was hoping it was just the initial breakout I kept reading about, but after about 3 months on the drug my acne became disfiguring with multiple huge cysts and whiteheads, and I also developed some sort of strange facial rash in conjunction with the acne. I also had horrible leg cramps and felt thirsty all the time despite drinking up to 10 glasses of water a day, So I guess next up is Accutane.